I'll get round to it at some point - Land Rover EPB defeated, stand by for further problems

[Rust Collector]

19 minutes ago, loserone said:

It's not so much that it's come from a hedge, more why did you put it there?

I don’t really remember. It ran out of MOT, and I think it might have just been left up there with the usual ‘I’ll come back to it’ thought, as I reckon I was running the Disco for towing at that point.

I’m pretty sure I need to chuck a patch on the passenger footwell, and replace some vacuum lines/solenoids (which I have in the garage). If it’s anything worse than that, I’m sure I’ll instantly remember/regret once I go and drive it around the farm.

[Snipes]

Weren't those Shogun Sports quite expensive when they were new?

[Rust Collector]

3 hours ago, Snipes said:

Weren't those Shogun Sports quite expensive when they were new?

I had never looked, but according to Parker’s they were about £17-25,000 new. The inflation calculator reckons that’s roughly between £32,000 and £47,000 in today’s money.

I bought this stunning* example for £550 a few years ago, and I reckon I’ve had my money’s worth out of it!

[High Jetter]

Years ago there was a guy who imported Mitsi Shoguns locally and sold them at attractive prices. Wonder if it came through them.

[Rust Collector]

41 minutes ago, High Jetter said:

Years ago there was a guy who imported Mitsi Shoguns locally and sold them at attractive prices. Wonder if it came through them.

This one was definitely a UK market car - the Japanese market version was called the Mitsubishi Challenger. Funnily enough, someone who lives two roads down from me has an imported Mitsubishi Challenger which is the spitting image of mine!

[J-T]

I’m pretty sure they were a Mitsubishi Challenger here as well when they first came out, then they became a Shogun Sport when they face lifted it.

Im really fun at parties.

[Rust Collector]

I went to go and look at the Shogun last night, and it’s just as good* as I remember:

Whilst it did fire up and drive, the alternator (or possibly the wiring - rodents aplenty up at the stables) isn’t charging.

So that can go back on the back burner.

Not an entirely wasted trip out though, as my mum got home and mentioned she had clipped a skip with her disco, and the trim was hanging off. I fixed that for her and went home.

Once home, I decided that I should probably do the sensible(ish) thing and fix my own disco - it’s been laid up after the electric parking brake shit its pants. As a quick recap, a previous owner or mechanic has left the waterproof lid off the EPB unit, and the insides have then enjoyed being soaked in water repeatedly as I was blissfully unaware.

I want to move the disco to the courtyard to do this work, which means moving the Lada. Moving the Lada means putting the gearbox back in. So I set about that.

Despite my best half-arsed efforts, I couldn’t get it home. The clutch plate is aligned and the input shaft has meshed with it, as I can turn the engine over by rotating the prop flange, but I can’t get the right angle to get the last bit of travel. I suspect I need to be a bit less lazy and remove the rear bracket from the gearbox so I can lift the tail higher.

I did get a second pair of eyes on it, just in case I was making a daft mistake:

But all they came up with was ‘just fucking scrap it M9’

The other problem with my plan to get the disco running is that the EPB module I need is about £130 if I want a new Chinese made one. Money is not abundant currently, due to a lot of changes all happening over the next 2-3 months including a looming payment of nearly a grand for childcare, so whilst £130 might seem like a small amount of money for fixing a car, it’s more than I can justify chucking at something which still needs a ticket putting on it.

We need a better plan then. And luckily, last night the pieces fell into place for this to happen.

I had previously discounted the idea of buying a secondhand EPB, as they generally cost as much, or even more than, the shitty chinese copies. Unable to sleep last night, I looked on eBay for one again… lo and behold, a breaker was selling one for the princely sum of £29.99. I added it to my watch list, and comforted by the thought of buying more shit parts and having to rip everything apart to make one half working thing out of two broken ones, I fell asleep to sweet dreams of all the ceilings in my house collapsing.

As if the future couldn’t get any brighter, I awoke to a notification of an offer on eBay - my inner mingebag was positively delighted to see that the EPB would now only cost me £28.19!

I’ve ordered that, so it’ll hopefully be with me by the weekend. I can’t be arsed to move the Lada now, so will just do the work on the disco out on the front drive where my neighbours can fully enjoy it. I’m about 60% confident that the combination of the used module and my old handbrake cables are something that I can assemble into something that passes an MOT.

[Rust Collector]

I’ve decided to spoil myself, and I’ve just ordered a set of the cheapest new parking brake cables eBay can offer - I’ve no doubt the ones on mine are probably completely shagged. This will hopefully make my life a bit easier when it comes to building up a ‘good’ module.

I’m sure two cables for £13 delivered will be absolutely fine*.

[Rust Collector]

Now that I’ve refreshed my memory as to how the parking brake will be parted from the disco, I took a peek under the arse end to check how shite my future could be.

It’s nearly as crusty underneath as the shitsubishi is. So surely unbolting this will be pure misery… hold on!

What bolts?! Turns out whoever was in here last did not put them back in. That saves me a job then, although might be worth tracking some down for when I refit it.

In a bit of pathetic moment of straw clutching, I did look to see if the creeping green death had made its way into the connector for the handbrake.

Looks good to me. At least that increases the possibility that the new(ish) parts won’t be a total waste of money.

I think I should stock up on structural paint as well, so I can brush everything down and spray a new chassis on. I can almost taste the bitumen now.

[grogee]

34 minutes ago, Rust Collector said:

handbrake.

Looks good to me

Yes, because we need THIRTY TWO PINS to connect a fucking handbrake motor. 

Bon chance mon ami

[Rust Collector]

1 minute ago, grogee said:

Yes, because we need THIRTY TWO PINS to connect a fucking handbrake motor. 

Bon chance mon ami

The best part is that if you leave it unconnected (it's only the handbrake wiring, right?) and then put the key in the ignition to start it , the whole fucking car explodes.

After I changed my pants, I had to reconnect the wiring before I could move it a foot forwards up the driveway.

[andy18s]

We found an incorrect brakelight bulb, the older 2pin setup instead of the offset style was enough to induce a meltdown in our D3... 

[Rust Collector]

1 hour ago, andy18s said:

We found an incorrect brakelight bulb, the older 2pin setup instead of the offset style was enough to induce a meltdown in our D3... 

I dimly (no pun intended) recall having issues with a bad filament in a brake bulb, which manifested itself as the ABS, ESP and suspension systems all taking a massive shit.

I’ve never seen it go as nuts as it did with the handbrake disconnected though - it wouldn’t even crank the engine, all the systems were going mad, bongs and chimes from the dash and the alarm chirping, the central locking was cycling every couple of seconds.

When it works I love it, they’re a brilliant car to roll about in, but I can only assume that JLR had the electrics for the D3 designed by a poltergeist.

[andy18s]

I guess being a pioneer of the Canbus systems meant a few issues were inevitable,but a bulb blowing shouldn't cause the whole vehicle to shutdown.

And don't mention the brakelight switch half-failing...

[AnnoyingPentium]

1 hour ago, Rust Collector said:

When it works I love it, they’re a brilliant car to roll about in, but I can only assume that JLR had the electrics for the D3 designed by a poltergeist.

I have to agree. The guy that lives across the road has had one for at least ten years now. I've seen it on more recovery flatbeds than I have it parked on his driveway.

[Rust Collector]

It’s not even 10am and I’ve already had to work my way through the entire physical persuasion scale once.

This can’t bode well.

[Rust Collector]

For context, this is what I’m up to.

The prize* is lurking here, above the diff:

I’m now taking a break to go and visit family friends with the kids for a change, as the ‘new’ module hasn’t fucking arrived (same day despatch apparently, which appears to translate to ‘do fuck all for three days and ignore messages’) so it’s not like I can finish the job.

Hopefully once I’m back then I’ll get the other side apart, pull the handbrake cables out and free the old parking brake module.

I’m half tempted to see if I can bring it back to life on the workbench, as I’m an impatient bastard.

[dozeydustman]

1 hour ago, Rust Collector said:

For context, this is what I’m up to.

The prize* is lurking here, above the diff:

I’m now taking a break to go and visit family friends with the kids for a change, as the ‘new’ module hasn’t fucking arrived (same day despatch apparently, which appears to translate to ‘do fuck all for three days and ignore messages’) so it’s not like I can finish the job.

Hopefully once I’m back then I’ll get the other side apart, pull the handbrake cables out and free the old parking brake module.

I’m half tempted to see if I can bring it back to life on the workbench, as I’m an impatient bastard.

I remember the aggro my dad had with his Disco 3 and the electric parking brake. I think it needed some kind of repair* or was an advisory* for every MoT he owned it. 

[Rust Collector]

6 hours ago, dozeydustman said:

I remember the aggro my dad had with his Disco 3 and the electric parking brake. I think it needed some kind of repair* or was an advisory* for every MoT he owned it. 

This one was ok(ish) until I submerged it in water - I had no idea someone had left the cover off the handbrake module, and the electrics didn’t enjoy taking a bath.

I think the common failure point on these handbrakes is the plastic gears, but I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s other fun stuff they can do to break.

[Rust Collector]

Family time ended up taking a bit longer than expected today, but it was nice to take a break for a change.

After the kids were in bed I got back out to the Land Rover, and took the calliper, carrier and disc off the other side.

I then removed the bracket from the parking brake module, so I could have a better look at the guts of it.

Not sure how well it shows in the photo, but there’s damage to the tracks on the PCB plus a coating of general sadness across the rest of the components.

Tomorrow I’ll be pulling the parking brake shoes out so that I can release the cables and pull everything out.

I think it’ll be interesting to strip it down and see exactly what shit its pants, but if you’re not as sad as me then YMMV.

[grogee]

1 hour ago, Rust Collector said:

I think it’ll be interesting to strip it down and see exactly what shit its pants, but if you’re not as sad as me then YMMV.

I think that too. Please report back. 

I note that Lucas' less reliable bastard child, Johnson Controls, is stamped on a component. 

[Rust Collector]

More progress today, nearly there now.

I had to pull the centre console out so that I could get to the end of the emergency parking brake release cable.

The plan being to chuck string on the end of it so I can hopefully have an easier time pulling it back through later. 

It wasn’t actually too bad to remove this from underneath the car, one heat shield had to be cautiously removed (including a lump of rust falling in my eye, and the exciting stumble down the driveway in search of the first aid kit).

I’ve now turned my focus to the rear cables, these are coming apart without too much grief at present.

The parking brake shoes are pretty shagged, but they’re going to have to do for now - if it passes the MOT then it’ll get sorted in the coming months.

I just need to do the nearside, and then I should be ready to start pulling the module out.

[Snipes]

That waterproof* lid probably only served to hold the water in anyways. 

[Rust Collector]

Well that sucked.

It’s out now though. Pulling the cables through was probably the most miserable part. To add some enjoyment, I laid down in an ants nest whilst doing the offside.

[Rust Collector]

25 minutes ago, Snipes said:

That waterproof* lid probably only served to hold the water in anyways. 

You’re probably not wrong!

[grogee]

14 minutes ago, Rust Collector said:

Well that sucked.

It’s out now though. Pulling the cables through was probably the most miserable part. To add some enjoyment, I laid down in an ants nest whilst doing the offside.

Thants

I had some ants helping* me adjust the rear wheel bearings on my Skoda yesterday. 

[Rust Collector]

I did pull everything apart, but there’s no smoking gun I’m afraid.

The motor and gear box were tested on the bench, and they’re tip-top (if you ignore the dirt I got on the gears) which is what I somewhat expected.

The board had corrosion over pretty much all of it.

My gut feel is that corrosion and/or a short has killed the microcontrollers, but I have no means of testing them. I did completely clean up the board with contact cleaner and a toothbrush, just in case…

No luck though.

I’ll just have to be patient and wait for the replacement.

In the meantime, I pulled the MAP sensor out to check it. Apparently if these get gummed up then it affects the performance*. My mum’s D3 feels like a rocket ship compared to this one, so I thought it worth a try cleaning this.

Once that was cleaned out, I set about sorting out the bonnet cable. At present, the bonnet doesn’t latch shut and relies on being poked with a pick in order to close - the man from the ministry won’t like that!

Credit to JLR, the grill comes off with no tools needed which is a good shout in my book.

In another good move, the bonnet pull is made from two separate cables which join in the engine bay - it’s the engine bay end that is bad on mine, so no need to fuck around pulling the dash end out if I decide to clean it.

Whilst pulling the latches out I found someone had been here before!

I tested the switch, and it seems like the paper clip will be staying.

This is where I fed oil in, once I had the cable vertical:

Working the cable for a while and feeding more oil on gradually seems to have freed it up. The bonnet releases and closes correctly now.

Last thing I did was chuck all the engine dress-up back on, as I’m hoping not to need to come back here now.

Thats removed a small amount of clutter from the garage! The compressor cover was in the garage too, so I’ve thrown that back on as well - more plastic under the car = less visible rust!

I’m getting really impatient for that handbrake module now - I’ll chase the seller again on Monday. I’ve got a horrible gut feeling that they’re going to cancel the sale, it did seem really cheap.

[grogee]

41 minutes ago, Rust Collector said:

Last thing I did was chuck all the engine dress-up back on, as I’m hoping not to need to come back here now.

 

[Rust Collector]

49 minutes ago, grogee said:

 

Yeah, I mean after my recent experience I’m always half waiting for the inevitable 🤣

I’m hoping that this old bus should be ok though, it was always alright-ish when I was running it, and the last two MOTs didn’t give any grief.

Setting myself up for a massive fall, aren’t I!

[High Jetter]

Handbrake? 1 lever, 1 cable pulls another.  Simples, why electrickery it?